


Magikarp

by XaviaAndromedovna



Category: Geography Club - All Media Types
Genre: Brian pov, Ficlet, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-30
Updated: 2013-05-30
Packaged: 2017-12-13 11:18:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 796
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/823685
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/XaviaAndromedovna/pseuds/XaviaAndromedovna
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Magikarp is said to be the world's weakest Pokémon. No one knows why it has managed to survive." -Diamond Pokedex</p>
            </blockquote>





	Magikarp

Brian Bund is the magikarp of Goodkind High School.  Everyone thinks he’s this pathetic, useless waste of space, and they make him the butt of every joke.  And if they're being honest, on the inside everyone is just a little amazed that he managed to survive this long at all, because if you’d put any of them in his position for even one day, they wouldn’t be able to stand it.

Russel Middlebrook knows this first hand now.  When he sits down at Brian’s table, the original outcast doesn’t throw it back in Russel’s face like he absolutely has the right to.  Instead, he helps the new outcast learn the ropes.  He teaches him Splash, so to speak (Brian always was kind of a nerd, and he’s certainly not ashamed of it).  Brian stopped hating people long ago; he sees them much more clearly when he doesn’t feel anything for them at all except a morbid curiosity punctuated by bouts of mortal terror when they actually _do_ something.  He gets that 95% of it is an act, that somehow he found himself the one thing everyone could agree on because there needed to be _some_ standard of social value to weigh themselves against.  There are of course those people who really do hate him, but Brian knows why, and he laughs about it sometimes when it won’t get him beaten up.

Russel asks him the one question no one bothered to ask before.  There was a time when Brian wasn’t as strong and he listened to what everyone said about him.  He started to believe them when they kept saying he was The Gay Kid.  But he’s not.  He knows that now, and it doesn’t bother him either way but it’s nice to know.  He tells Russel that no, he’s not gay.

Brian actually likes Russel.  He’s only ever made fun of him once, that time in the stairwell when he was really starting to climb the social ladder.  Brian lies to make him feel better, but he did happen to remember that particular instance, because it _was_ so rare.  He knows that this isn’t easy for Russel, knows that it’s not safe for him at this school to be who he is, so he lets it slide, because Russel gets it now.  He’s sitting at Brian’s table, and the only rule at Brian’s table is that everyone is safe from everyone else there seated.

Brian knows all about Russel’s current dilemma, because as much as he hates to admit it, today was the most peaceful day of his high school career.  It was the first and only day no one made fun of him, not one person.  They were too busy talking about Russel.  Brian’s not sure what scares him more— that he’s so used to being bullied that it feels weird to be treated like everyone else, or that Russel might not be strong enough to handle the pressure.

It’s that second fear that makes him do what he does next.  He changes the name on the application for the Gay-Straight Alliance to his and backdates it one day.  If he can prevent another person from dealing with what he has to deal with, then he can shoulder it.  After all, the worst they can call him is a name they’ve always called him anyway.

At lunch the next day, the cafeteria goes quiet.  Brian is confused for a second, because that usually means something’s happening to him, but it isn’t.  Well, not directly.  Russel sits down beside him.  Instantly, Brian knows he helped the right person.  Brian had pretty much guessed that the Geography Club wasn’t what they said it was, and it's nice to hear that Min had suggested several times that Brian be invited to join.  Well, they certainly can’t kick him out of his own damn club, so he decides to stick with the Gay-Straight Alliance.  Who knows, maybe they really can change things in this school.

When magikarp evolve, they become gyrados, one of the strongest, scariest Pokémon out there.  The secret to their survival in the wild is two-fold: they have no interest in competing with other Pokémon in their nonsense, and they’re stronger in numbers.  They support each other like no one’s business, precisely because they refuse to fight.  For a long time, Brian Bund was a lone magikarp, banking on the knowledge that someday he’d be able to eff stuff up gyrados-style, and people would eventually realize that they messed with the wrong person.  But he doesn’t need that anymore.  He’s found his school of fellow magikarp now, and it makes it that much easier to splash around without a care.  For the first time in his high school career, he knows he’ll be just fine.


End file.
